We Need Each Other, Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. Why are we here? For others.

The lost and the saved. You see, that's why we're here. We're to do good to all men, but especially those of the household of faith. We are free to bear one another's burdens and we are free to share one another's blessings.

That should be how we relate to each other. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's word meets our world. We are free by grace. We are free to stand firm against a slavery religion. We are we are free to overcome the power of our own flesh in our lives. We are free to live our lives under the control of the Spirit of God and bear its fruit. And he says, and we are free to bear one another's burdens.

Free to apply the law of love. There's something more, though. In order to do that, doesn't that require something? Real relationships with people. You can't bear burdens of someone if you don't have real relationships.

You can't. You see, it just doesn't work that way. And that's one of the sad things. So many Christians don't have real relationships with other Christians.

And I don't mean the church has tried to address that all churches over the years. And so they try to have a small group or support. They try to put people together and they think that maybe this will work.

And sometimes it does, but so often it doesn't. And the reason is to have this kind of relationship, someone that you can bear the burden and that you can restore them when they're caught in a trespass. It's going to require something of that relationship. You better have a trusting relationship.

It has to be real. It has to be trusting. When I was a student at the school, they started these spiritual life groups of students and they said, you guys don't have enough spiritual accountability at the seminary. So they said, let's get together.

And once a week for half an hour, you get together and you pray and you bear one another's burdens. And so we did that. And really, it was in the second year of the group of about four or five guys that were together. We found out that two of the guys were involved in things, especially in sin.

That was terrible, horrific. And you know what we knew about it? Nothing. And in fact, one of the guys didn't go back to the school because of it. You know why? He wasn't going to share that. He wasn't going to share that.

Why? We didn't have that kind of relationship. We met for 30 minutes a week because we were told to. That's not a real relationship. You have to have a certain amount of trust before you're really open to bear one another's burdens. You have to have a relationship, a real relationship with certain Christians in your life so that this can take place in your life.

And you can't prescribe it. It has to be something natural and something real in people's lives. So we are free to bear one another's burdens. And then Paul moves in verse six. We are free to share one another's blessings. We are free to share one another's blessings. That's what the body of Christ should be about. He said the one who is taught, the one who is taught the word is to share all good things with the one who teaches him. There you go.

Now you guys are obligated to me. Says it right there in the Bible. Well, it does say in the Bible in many places that the ox is worthy to be fed is the analogy that is used. And the one who labors in the word is worthy to be supported. But I don't think that's what Paul is talking about here.

It could be part of it, but I don't think it is. First of all, he said the one who was taught the word is to share. That word is Koinea. That's the word fellowship, the name of our church. It's the word Koinea and Koinea means all things in common, exactly like the church was in Acts Chapter four.

In verse 32, Luke said that the church had all things in common and it was abounding in grace. That's a sense of what Koinea means. But he says they are to share all good things with the one who teaches them.

Now, that could mean your beach house, your 401k, your car. It could, but I don't think it does. I don't think that's what it means. You see, it's all in the word good. If it was talking about material things that he used the word Kalos, the normal Greek word for good, good things. This is not the word Kalos. This is the word Agathos. And Agathos means something that is spiritually good, that is morally good, those good things. For example, in Romans 10, the exact word is used in verse 15.

And this is what Paul wrote there. How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news of good things. Well, what's the good things of Jesus? What's the good things of the gospel? Is it money?

No. What's the good things of the gospel? Joy, forgiveness, hope, peace, purpose, meaning. That's the good things of the gospel. That's what that means.

Agathos. It means the good things. In other words, I should share the blessing of the ability to teach with you and you should share spiritual things with me. That's what that means. That's what Paul is talking about. Just yesterday morning, this was on my desk, a letter. We get letters virtually every week. In fact, my wife told me of another letter that was that she had just received. And this one just came in the mail.

And it's exactly what this passage is saying. This person wrote, it's an out of state listener on the radio, said, Dear Pastor Bill, please know that I'm still listening to your radio, to you on the radio station here in this other state. I listen every single morning at 730. Just a letter of encouragement to you and your staff to keep this radio program on the air. It means so much to me. God has really blessed you to preach his word.

This week, I really like the story about a young boy going to a birthday party with his dad watching over him. You know, I never thought about God watching over me like that. It touched my heart. All I ever was sort of had the convicting aspect of how God watches over me. It was always like how he watches out and watches over me to catch me in sin. More and more, I am learning that our God has that our sin has been forgiven. It's now, he said, it is now just for us to live like we were already part of God's kingdom and repent when our human sinful side gets in the way. One day, I hope to visit your church, but for now, I am unable to make the drive. I want to thank you so much. I want to thank all of you. People are listening and we are being blessed and growing in every sermon we hear on the radio. That's what this is.

That's Agathos. You see, that's the blessing. That's what it this means. The blessing of encouragement. It was interesting. I read this in the first service. And after the first service, I ran into a family. They come up, they introduce themselves, and they were from Macon, Georgia. And he was in town.

They applied for a doctoral program at the seminary here in town. And he's been listening for years. And he just wanted to encourage me on the basis of what we were just preaching. That's what this means. See, the idea is, what is it that you bring to the table?

What's your blessing? Then how do you share this? That's exactly what he is saying. That's why, by the way, this is an obligation, because in the next two verses, there's a wrong way to do this and there's a right way to do this. And Paul wants to make sure. In fact, the next two verses seem abrupt. They're famous verses, but they seem out of context at first. Paul then says, do not be deceived.

God is not mocked. For whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh, he said, will from his own flesh reap corruption. But the one who sows to the Spirit, he said, will from the Spirit reap eternal life.

Wow. You see, Paul, it sounds like a proverb right there in the middle of what he was saying. But Paul was saying, there's two ways you can go about doing this. There's two ways you can share the blessings of your life.

You can do it in a fleshly way or you can do it in a spiritual way. And it's all the difference in the world. You see, this reaping and sowing is an absolute law. This is just like gravity. Gravity is gravity.

It's a law. I mean, you can go up the second story window today, this afternoon. You could test it if you want. You can step out the window.

And I don't know how long your legs would hold up, but you can test it over and over again. And guess what's going to happen every time you step out the window? You're hitting the ground. It's gravity. That's the same thing with reaping and sowing. You sow a certain action, you're going to reap a consequence.

It's just the way it is. And he said, and the reason it's that way, God's not mocked. You see, that's a very important thing. And then he talks about this idea, I've noticed, the one who sows to his own flesh. You see, if it's all about me, and that's my perspective of the blessing. For example, if I came after a message like this and said, now you understand how to apply this, all of you are here to bless me. That's my expectation. All you'll reap out of that is corruption. You see, but if you take the spiritual perspective and it's all about you, it's not about me at all, it's all about you, then you reap the blessing.

That's what he is saying. You see, it's sort of like planning. Whatever your blessing is, maybe some of you are tremendous prayer warriors who do intercessory prayer. Some of you are encouragers. Some of you are servants and hands-on kind of people that can help people with physical needs.

Some of you might be teachers, whatever it is. That's your blessing. That's what you sow. That's the seed.

You see, and it always is going to come out to be what it is if it's motivated correctly. If you take a seed of wheat and you plant it in the ground, guess what you get? Wheat. You're not getting pineapples. It's not going to happen that way. You see, it won't happen that way. So if you take what you have and you use it for others, you will reap what you have sown.

Well, how much do you do this? Well, in 2 Corinthians 9, Paul said this, He who sows sparingly will reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully, he'll reap bountifully. Why is Paul telling us that here? It's not about the other person.

It's about us. You see, if I want the blessings of God in my life, then I have to consider, as he said to the Philippians, everybody else is more important than me. You see, I have to invest what God has blessed in me and other people. That's what he is saying.

And that's not an easy thing to do. Notice then, he says, For the one who sows in his own flesh will reap, he says, corruption, but the one who sows in the Spirit will reap eternal life. The real question is, when do we reap it? When?

When do I reap? Here's the answer. I have no idea.

Okay? God gives you a nice, very specific thing. He says in the next one, due time. Who gets to establish due time?

God. In other words, could it be immediately? Here's a sermon, gets on a typewriter, types this up, or on a computer, and sends this in the mail, and you get encouraged right away.

That's pretty neat. But sometimes you don't get encouraged at all. Sometimes it's immediately, sometimes it's delayed, but I can tell you one thing. It'll always, always, always happen in eternity. You see, always, you'll get it, but in due time. Now, here's the problem that we have.

There's a struggle that we have then. Verse 9, Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not, what? Grow weary.

Here's the two big enemies, and they're from within you. Lose heart, grow weary. You ever do that? You see? Have you ever said about some responsibility you have to other people, how many times am I going to do?

Right? You start losing heart. You start growing weary. It happens to all of us. Believe me, all of us. This last month or so, I've had a personal pity party for Bill, okay? And it was exactly what was happening here, and mostly it was affecting just me, but to be honest, I was feeling like I'm done.

Weary, done. Losing heart. That's just the way I felt. And I was keeping to myself and just moping around like that.

Not with you guys, but at home I was. So I decided I would share that with my wife, and I did. And I shared to her, like, you know, I've invested all these years, and now I don't know what's come of anything.

You know, this is just so, you know, hard. And she said to me, that thought did not come from Jesus Christ. That thought came from somewhere else.

There's no place for a thought like that at all. No, it wasn't what I wanted to hear at the time. I mean, but it was exactly what I needed to hear. It was exactly what I needed to hear. You see, it was someone who was spiritual restoring someone who was caught.

That's exactly what it was. And then I'm doing this sermon, and last week I'm reading through this text and doing the observational stage first. And then I read, it says, let us not lose heart in doing good, nor for in due time we will reap if we don't grow weary. And you know what I heard?

It was as though the Lord whispered in my ear, Bill, she was right. It's right here in the Bible. You see, what causes us to lose heart and grow weary?

I know what it is. It's lack of devotion to Jesus Christ. It's a lack of love for Jesus Christ.

It's loving me more than Him. It's a lack of prayer, honest prayer. You see, that's what it is.

It's always that. One of my great heroes in the faith who's now with the Lord, as I've said many times in the past, was our owner, and the words that art lived by. And he lived by them were simply this, anything, anywhere, anytime, at any cost. That's how he felt about his Lord.

Anything, anywhere, anytime, at any cost. And he ended up in the upper Amazon. He was all over the world with the Lord. You see, he never grew weary.

He didn't lose heart. You see, the truth of the matter is, can we honestly say that? See, will you do anything for the Lord? Well, I'll do a lot of things. Anywhere for the Lord? Well, as long as it's within driving distance of home.

You know, anytime? Well, yes, but we're real busy for the next six months. At any cost.

I don't know if I'd pay that much. Then you'll grow weary. You see, I see this, so many Christian marriages failing. And this is the passage. They grow weary.

They lose heart. And I hear it. I've done my part. I've done my part as unto the Lord.

I've taken my responsibilities and I've done it. And you know what I got out of it? You know what I reaped?

Nothing. I'm out. I quit.

You see what that is? That's growing weary. That's losing heart. Notice the Bible says that God says in due time. He decides when.

You don't decide when. Not if you're devoted to Jesus Christ. And then in verse 10, he summarizes the whole thing. He says, so then while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially those who are of the household of faith. Why we are here?

He sounds just like Charlie Brown. Right there. Why are we here? For others.

The lost and the saved. You see, that's why we're here. We're to do good to all men. But especially those of the household of faith. We are free to bear one another's burdens and we are free to share one another's blessings. That should be how we relate to each other.

Now, the funny part of this is how it ends. That's where the epistle should have ended, I think. Now, Paul may have a different opinion when I meet him in heaven.

But I think that's when it should have ended. But remember, I told you, Paul never wrote an epistle that he was so emotional about. He was angry in this epistle. He was intense. He was really feeling it when he wrote this letter. And so, it's as though in verse 11, he just decides, one more time.

I'm going after this one more time. One more time, I've got to ventilate. And that's exactly what he does. He ventilates about the Judaizers, the legalists, the religious crowd. He ventilates about the Lord and about himself. First, he says, notice, see with what large letters I am writing to you with my own hand. We talked about his poor eyesight.

His letters were always dictated. And he can't see very well, but he's writing this on his own. He said, I'm going to tell you how I feel about this, but I'm going back over this one more time. And notice what he says about the legalists. He says, those who desire to make a good showing in the flesh try to compel you to be circumcised simply so that they will not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. He said, I'll tell you one thing about the Judaizers, the legalists.

He said, they're motivated by fear. The only reason they're telling you you have to be circumcised is so the Jewish community doesn't ostracize them. Because if they told you the truth of the gospel, the Jewish community will ostracize them and they won't like it. That's why they want you circumcised. Then he says in verse 13, for those who are circumcised do not even keep the law themselves, but they desire, he said, to have you circumcised so that they may boast in your flesh.

Two more things. One is, they're hypocrites. He said, when they tell you, well, we keep the law, they're liars.

No one keeps the law. They're just hypocrites. And he says, thirdly, he said, they just want to brag. They are proudful braggarts. They want to boast in saying, we straightened out the Galatians.

We got the Galatians under the law. He said, may it never be, when he talks about himself, he says, may it never be that I would boast. Paul said, I would never boast because I want to tell you something about the Lord and the cross. He said, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, he says, through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. He said, you know what? I know the person of the cross. I know Jesus Christ.

And there's something else here. He says, I know the power of the cross. The world was crucified to me and I was crucified to the world.

He said, for neither is circumcision anything nor uncircumcision, but I know what I am. I'm a new creation. That's what he wrote to the Corinthians. You're a new creature in Christ.

All the old things have passed away. He said, I know the person of the cross. That's Jesus Christ. I know the power of the cross. It crucified the world to me and me to the world and it made me a new creation.

God has taken up residency in me. And then he says, and those who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them and upon the Israel of God. He said, it's given me a way to live, to live by this rule.

I've got purpose. I know the person of the cross. I know the power of the cross. I know, he said, the purpose of the cross. And then he says something more about himself in verse 17. He says, from now on, let no one cause trouble for me, for I bear, he said, on my body the brand marks of Jesus. He said, I have suffered for the gospel. I have suffered for grace.

He said, I don't enjoy that, but I'm willing to suffer. And then he says his last word, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brethren. Amen. The last word of the epistle is what the whole epistle is about, the grace of God. He said, I want grace to be upon you. Grace has set us free to stand firm against religiosity. It has set us free that we can overpower our own flesh.

It set us free so that we can live by the Spirit of God and bear the fruit of the Spirit. And we learned this morning that we are free to bear one another's burdens, and we are free to share one another's blessings. What a privilege to be a believer in Jesus Christ.

Let's pray. Father, this morning my prayer is simple. If there is someone here who still believes that they will be justified before you someday by believing in Jesus Christ, but by also living up to religious responsibilities, religious obligations, that they believe that they will be someday justified before you because they've jumped through religious hoops, I pray that this epistle is as clear to them as it was to Martin Luther, that it is faith and faith alone and Christ and Christ alone by the grace of God. And Father, for those of us who are already believers, I would pray that we understand the great blessing of grace. Not only are our sins forgiven, not only is Heaven our destiny, but we are free. We are free from the obligation of religion, and we are free from the power and the corruption of our own flesh. Father, may we thank you for that freedom. May we enjoy it in such a way that it shows our love and devotion to you and our love for one another. This we pray in Christ's name.

Amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts, or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called oneplace.com. That's oneplace.com, and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online. At that website, you will find on only the website that you can go to. That's oneplace.com, and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online. At that website, you will find on only the website that you can go to.

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That's fbcnola.org. At our website, you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for, or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for, you can listen online, or if you prefer, you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember, you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again, our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt, thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word. .